Opinion pieces & commentary

If there was one product that cemented the myth of the “Apple tax” – the supposedly excessive price premium paid for the logo – it was the MacBook Air. People would point to Apple’s cheapest laptop costing $1,000 and loudly proclaim that you could buy a Windows machine or Chromebook from around $300.

The comparison was of course spurious. The cheap laptops being used to make the argument were ugly plastic things with exceedingly poor specs compared to the MacBook Air. Still, it was undeniable that a four-figure starting price did prove a barrier to a lot of people – but all that has changed with the MacBook Neo …

As expected, Apple has today announced the new iPhone 17e with some worthwhile upgrades over its predecessor.

The new model gets full support for MagSafe wireless charging and storage has been doubled to 256GB for the same price. There is, however, one very surprising thing about the upgrade …

We’re gearing up for the official announcement of the low-cost MacBook this week, and Apple reportedly believes it will offer “incredible value.”

The company thinks it will bring two types of new user into the Mac world. That’s important not just for sales of the MacBook itself, but what it means for the Mac lineup as a whole – even for those of us who have no plans to buy the machine …

Samsung loves to launch new features before Apple, and it has partly done so with the new AI capabilities in the Galaxy S26. The latest version of Galaxy AI seeks to perform many of the same functions as Apple Intelligence.

As our sister site 9to5Google notes, however, the experience seems set to prove very underwhelming …

We know from Steve Jobs that Apple’s experiments with touchscreen Macs date back to at least 2008. At the time he said it was a “terrible” idea.

A lot has changed since then, and reports that we are finally going to see a touchscreen Mac have grown in credibility to the point where it now seems more likely than not. I’ve so far been a little concerned about the idea, but the latest report gives me confidence …

With the recent launch of tools like OpenAI’s Codex, Anthropic’s Claude Agent, and the upcoming support for these tools right in Xcode, the market for single-purpose apps might not be long for this world. Here’s why.

Once the new low-cost MacBook launches this week, those wanting to buy a portable Mac will have a choice of three ranges: the MacBook, the MacBook Air, and the MacBook Pro.

For those with very undemanding or demanding needs, the choice may be very obvious – the low-cost MacBook on the one hand, or a MacBook Pro on the other. But what about those who sit somewhere in the middle … ?

One of the core Apple Intelligence features to date has been Visual Intelligence. It started off in a rather limited capacity through Camera Control, but with iOS 26, the company expanded it to screenshots. I’ve found those capabilities very useful thus far, and I’d love to see Apple take it even further.

Apple’s low-cost MacBook has been a long time coming, but it now seems clear that we can expect it to be launched in the first week of March.

Apple has a special event taking place on March 4, but a subsequent report says that this will not include a keynote presentation. Instead, it says we can expect a series of press releases along the lines of the ones we saw back in 2024 …

The long-awaited low-cost MacBook powered by an A18 Pro chip is now expected to launch on March 4. It will reportedly be priced somewhere around $700, making it significantly cheaper than an entry-level MacBook Air.

Given that the upcoming machine is likely to meet the needs of a great many of those who currently opt for the MacBook Air, it could cannibalize a lot of sales. One possible solution to this is to use the strategy Apple once adopted with the iBook and Powerbook lineups …

It’s been nearly a decade since the introduction of the first 120Hz ProMotion display, if you can believe that. It was one of the flagship features of the 2017 iPad Pro. However, all this time later – Apple still treats it as some form of luxury feature, and I feel like it’s holding them back.

One of the more persistent and long-standing Apple rumors has been the launch of new AirPods models with built-in cameras. Another leaker added their support for this idea just yesterday.

Exactly what role these cameras would perform has been the subject of much speculation, with some suggesting they will be used to support Apple Intelligence visual features. While that is certainly possible, I can’t help wondering whether the reports point to support for hand gestures similar to those used with Vision Pro …

Like it or not, there’s no turning back: apps and operating systems will steadily gravitate toward voice-first interactions.

Yesterday saw a couple of claimed leaks about the iPhone Fold, one of them unremarkable, the other somewhat more surprising.

The first of them is almost certainly true, coming from a leaker with a good track record and in line with existing expectations. The second is a bit more of a wild card, but it does make sense to me …

The list of Apple subscription services keeps growing. iCloud, Apple Music, Apple TV, Apple Arcade, Apple Fitness+, Apple News+, MLS Season Pass, Apple One … The company of course also takes a cut of subscriptions sold through the App Store, Apple Books, and Apple Podcasts. Then there are the hardware-related subscriptions, AppleCare+ and the iPhone Upgrade Program.

Most recently, we’ve had the launch of Apple Creator Studio, and a new report says that we can expect to see even more subscriptions to come …

Apple Watch certainly feels like a rather mature platform at this point. Software wise, there isn’t usually a ton I’d like to see – though there probably is a lot of potential for the Apple Watch to serve as an AI wearable. Nonetheless, there is one nifty software upgrade I’d really like to see them add to the Apple Watch.

At least 37 attorneys general for US states are responding to the ongoing problem of the Grok chatbot creating child sexual abuse materials (CSAM).

It follows the app being banned in two countries and investigations being opened in both the UK and EU, but both Apple and Google have so far ignored requests for them to temporarily remove Grok and X from their respective app stores …

For the past 10 years or so, I have been a happy Bartender customer, singing its praises to anyone who’d hear. Alas, macOS Tahoe 26 seems to have broken it beyond repair. Now, I’ll just wait for Apple to inevitably Sherlock its core feature, which I can’t believe hasn’t happened yet.

Confirmation that Microsoft handed over BitLocker keys to the FBI for three Windows laptops is being contrasted with Apple standing up to the same agency back in 2015.

However, the comparison isn’t actually fair, and there is a simple way for Windows users to ensure their encrypted data remains secure …

A report yesterday said that we will see a Siri chatbot as part of iOS 27, despite the company previously dismissing this idea.

If accurate, this will see the company adopt a two-stage strategy to finally giving the new Siri the smarts it has long lacked …

Yesterday brought a surprising report about the development of an Apple pin, which The Information likened to the mysterious and as-yet-unreleased AI hardware device designed by Jony Ive.

I have a pretty strong suspicion about what the Apple pin is, and I’m very confident indeed that I know what it isn’t …